Mikey

Messi's been better than Ronaldo

Well there's the whole point really! Barca are rebuilding, Real have a pair of Donkeys and Guti, both Milan side have been over-run in CM in Europe this season. Yet only Juventus are offering for him - strange!

Two points Having to sell to buy players = Can we buy Barry without selling Alonso, and would Rafa not rather have both? If not then we have to sell players in order to buy regardless of how you want to phrase it. Torres going for £70M = £40M + Drogba = Villa + Benzema + Ribery I'm not saying we should sell him but lets not be stupid and pretend every footballer doesn't have a price. United, the World's richest club and CL & PL winners are probably going to lose the best player in the World this Summer FFS!

Firstly let me say that when this first came up the prospect of selling Alonso for between £15M and £20M and replacing him with Barry for £10-12M was appealing to me. But this is a pisstake now, the only player Villa have who is worth anywhere near £18M is Ashley Young and if Rafa actually buys Barry for that money and he ends up being our flagship signing this Summer well being underwhelmed won't get anywhere near it. Big Summer for Rafa this, he needs to make sure we don't spend all our budget and not improve.

Don't be f***ing daft, we're struggling to get £15M for Alonso from the only side interested in signing him and Pennant would fetch between £3M & £5M if we could find anyone to actually buy him. Swapping Alonso + Pennant + £2M for Barry and Milner isn't bad business in my opinion. Still leaves a big chunk of money unused if the £20M + sales budget for Rafa is true, we'll have spent £9M net with Carson, Crouch, Riise, Guthrie and possibly Finnan and Aurelio to go we're still looking at nearly £35M to spend.

Dn't get your point - they did spend £25M on more than one player and won the PL and CL double. We didn't and won nothing so maybe you actually do necessarily need to be spending £25M on players?

£20M + sales aint actually that bad this Summer as we 're looking at recouping £30M+ on outgoing players. Milner is better than Pennant and will be a squad player not a first choice if he arrives with no extra cost, he's also more of a Rafa type to me, works extremely hard and can play right or left. Riise out and Degen and Dossena in for an extra £2M - if Dossena is even the 3rd best Italian LB he could actually be very good. Alonso out and Barry in for £2M less means we've not touched the original £20M and we've still potentially got Carson, Crouch, Guthrie, definite leavers and possibly Aurelio and Finnan as well - around £20M there as well. £40M to spend = Christiano Ronaldo please!

Just out of interest as it seems we can't raise £5M to buy Ramsey but everyone's OK because we're putting the money towards Villa/Silva/Ribery - what will be said if we don't actually get anyone of that calibre and instead get Milner and Riera/Downing?

So you expect a multi-billion pound organisation to discuss its finance plans for a football club it doesn't even own with a teenager its never met before??????? FFS Far too busy trying to get at Ant, you want to grow up and leave it.

Right..........can someone from SoS please shed a little more light on the "Gillett can sell anytime he wants to" bit please? FFS I am really struggling to believe that a call to action to try and exert some pressure on these two gobs****s has degenerated into this f***ing farce! Far too many posters on here are far too busy trying to score points off Ant and f***ing up every thread he posts in to do it. Ask yourselves this one question please What happens if we don't get rid of the Yanks?

We can dress this up any way we want but the hard fact is we are having to sell our players before we can buy, and we are not competing for the top level of talent when we do buy. Of course this may change if DIC finally buy us but currently all this "perhaps we're being clever letting people think we're skint to keep prices down" is just juvenile nonsense. We are 'skint' compared to all of our rivals in the top 4, and also compared to the raft of clubs trying to catch us. Tottenham, Man City and probably Newcastle will spend more NET than us this Summer. David Villa?? Don't make me laugh.

He's Chelsea's best defender by a country mile - John 'JT' Terry gets all the plaudits because he's a good old fashioned, thick as f*** English centre half while Carvalho is bloody brilliant.

£10M was a fair offer, £12M is very top end, any higher there are better options available for the same or less money.

Arsenal accordingto the report. Shoein for them with their record of bringing through young english players.

Isn't this where Real, Barca, AC Milan and Inter come charging in to buy him? All of them need a CM!

Funnily enough Pennant has had his best games this season against the best fullbacks, he got the bettter of both Ashley Cole against Chelsea and Clichy for Arsenal. Its against the not so good but rough types he struggles! Bentley is better than Pennant but not what we need at £15M, would much rather take a look at Milner for £5M as its unlikely either will be first choice in 4-3-3.

So how do the ECB get away with its one foreigner per team rule?

Would be very happy to effectively swap Pennant for Milner.

Did we f***ing ever!

So when he isn't in the first team for the Euro's will you still say that he's first choice, bearing in mind he's 100% fit and been solely responsible for our superb end of season form? I've got £25 for the HJC says that he won't be in the starting 11 for their first match in Euro 08, do you have the same amount saying that he will?

So, assuming he doesn't start in the Euro's it kinda backs up the theory offered by us heretics that his game has dropped off a bit over the last 2 years yeah?

My points crude? How hurtful! He's not first choice for Spain regardless of how many caps he's got already, he is a very good passer of the football when he has time, we'll see how highly rated he is away from this forum in the next few weeks won't we? Crude?

There's a very real case to be made that Alonso isn't in the top three in the Spanish squad in his position - let alone the world. Leaving aside the "is he a defensive midfielder or a playmaker" rubbish Spain will start with Xavi and Fabregas in the centre with Iniesta playing out of position to get him in the side as well. We'll see how "World class" he's rated now won't we because surely Barca, Real and Ac Milan will all be in for him now they know he's available. If we get anywhere near £20M for him its a result for us in my opinion obviously.

And this season we've been the 4th best club so using your argument there has been no improvement whatsoever since Evans's day. And this inspite of us having one of the best 2 keepers, best DM in Masch, best CM in Gerrard and best striker in Torres?

United have a much stronger, more expensive squad than us even though Carrick, Hargreaves, Brown, O'Shea, Fletcher, Anderson etc are all s**** and not fit to lace the boots of Alonso - forum lore! Chelsea are the same even though Mikel, Ballack, 'Fat Frank', Joe Cole, Malouda etc are all s**** and not fit to lace the boots of Alonso - forum lore! Arsenal are no-hopers because their squad players like Bendtner, Eduardo, Eboue, Gilberto Silva etc are all s****, not fit to lace Alonso's boots and Wenger f*cked up this season and everyone on here with half a brain could tell it was going to happen from February. Why aren't we winning it every year is the question for me? Yes it is fair to expect Rafa to put in a better, more sustained challenge in the PL and compete for the CL at the same time. Yes it is fair to hope to win the PL. It is not fair to continue to invent excuses why this doesn't happen and to attempt to move the goalposts regarding what we have a right to expect as fans of Liverpool football club. I wasn't convinced by Rafa at Xmas as stated on here many times, I'm still not totally convinced and believe that if he continues with his policy of buying quantity against quality he should be answerable for the results.